Sometimes you don’t need dialogue in your short film to make it captivating. This ride-along video at the Nürburgring, featuring a Caterham 340R with far more grip than power, is a new high point for me in YouTube cinematic review. The lighting and character development leave a little to be desired, but the film chooses a gorgeous venue and an enigmatic protagonist to capture our attention for the full nine minute and five second run time.
Given my druthers, I would rent out a theater for a full-sized screening of this on repeat for an hour. Each rewatch is more powerful than the last, not least of which because this guy has guts to leave it all on the track. You don’t. None of us do.
Most of this film’s tourist-day lap at the Nordschleife is spent chasing down a Ring Freaks rental Porsche Cayman GTS (449 Euros for 2 laps), though it’s clear the lightweight British flyweight has the better of the mid-engine German in the tight and technical. Prodigious grip and a sub-1,300 pound road weight give this car a serious advantage under braking and lateral grip, but the lackluster 1950s aerodynamics and 165 horsepower 2-liter Ford Duratec engine mean it can’t match the Porsche when the road straightens out. While the Caterham can hang for most of the lap, the Cayman leaves it for dead once they reach the Döttinger Höhe, for example.
There’s just something so visceral about ripping a quasi-open-wheel tiny machine around this massive 12.944 mile circuit. There’s so little separating the driver from any outside influences, whether they be wind, noise, or guardrail. You don’t have what it takes to do even one lap of the track in a stripped back car like this one. Prove me wrong.
